There's an on-line petition... here.
It won't of course do any good, but I guess it does't hurt to let them know that we are aware that most other countries treat their pensioners with a bit more respect than the UK does.
Monday, 30 May 2016
Sunday, 29 May 2016
Saturday, 28 May 2016
SOPPY SUNDAY
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| 1. I'm just contemplating my forest, so you carry on and enjoy Soppy Sunday. |
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| 2. Britanny. |
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| 3. Castellucio. |
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| 4. Clouds |
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| 5. Like my field? I got plenty of daisies and dandelions... I'll sell you some? |
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| 6. Do you love me, dad? |
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| 7. Isle of Man. |
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| 8. Skye. |
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| 9. I wonder if they are good to eat? |
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| 10. Bluebell wood. |
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| 11. I'm not convinced that best friends sit on each other. |
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| 12. Greenland winter sun. |
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| 13. It's all right I'll look after the dog. |
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| 14. Where's that nut I buried? |
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| 15. Alaska. |
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| 16. Sunset in Kirkcaldy. |
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| 17. Sunset in Nauru. |
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| 18. Lunchtime here. Not got time to look up. |
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| 19. Don't you think I'm pretty cute? |
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| 20. OK, you've all had enough soppiness for one day. Now you all have stuff to do. The car won't wash itself and that lawn needs cutting so jump to it... or I'll get cross, and trust me, you don't want that! |
Friday, 27 May 2016
IN OUT, IN OUT, SHAKE IT ALL ABOUT...
This blog has taken a neutral view of the EU referendum from the date it was announced.
There is a good deal that we like about the EU, and a good deal that we don't.
In our opinion the main protagonists in the argument so far (as portrayed by the press) have been largely from the Tory Party which is successfully tearing itself apart. That, of course, is something we have no trouble with. Although we think it was madness to stir up this bother just as the Labour Party were descending into internecine warfare over Corbyn actually being a socialist.
A better Tory leader could have managed the internal unrest over Europe, given that it has been bubbling under for years. But then, where would one of them come from?
We can't for the life of us imagine why anyone in their right minds would trust the word of people like Farage, Johnson, Gove, Duncan Smith or Grayling on the one hand, or the word of Cameron, Gideon, May on the other. They all appear to us to be quintessential incompetents. At best they are figures of fun.
We are lucky not to have done ourselves serious damage while falling about laughing at the similarity of the arguments of "Remain" in this EU referendum to those of "NO", "UKOK", or "Better Together" in our referendum. But then the arguments of the "Leave" side have been equally outlandish. It's been like there were two Project Fears at each other's throats.
Downright lying on both side, usually by people who KNEW they were lying (or were incredibly stupid) has been a mark of the campaigns. They are treating the public like it is comprised of terminally stupid gullible idiots, ready to believe the very worst/the very best according to their newspaper of choice.
We continue to take no side, and will do until the wretched thing is over and done with. The only way to remain sane is to laugh like a drain.
European elections have always been low turnout affairs. We suspect the turnout for this referendum will be lower than that of 1975, in itself considered low at the time (42.2%), partly becasue of its proximity to other elections (parliamentary in Wales, NI and Scotland, and local in England), and partly because of the mess that the leaders in the Uk have made of the campaigns.
For a much more serious look at these matters we recommend the excellent Doug Daniel article here. It's really first rate.
We also recommend the continuing story of Britain in the EU by Dr Craig Dalzell of the Green party. Second part now up.
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Next step in EURef. Jane Hill stands outside WM & does series of live updates backed by Brexit posters while ignoring Remain rally.
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Unanimous Treasury Committee report says both REMAIN and LEAVE Campaigns are lying. It's true. Why should voters vote? #MassBoycott? #EUref
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The "we" we are using in this post is not royal in origins. Munguin has still not been assimilated into the royal family (although we might recommend him to princess Beatrice).
We just thought that it was a collective thing, as opposed to Tris's opinion, and that it would be better expressed in the plural.
We hope you don't think we were being pretentious.
Pretentious? Nous?
Thursday, 26 May 2016
THINGS AREN'T LOOKING TOO GOOD FOR BLAIR
It's not often, indeed very rarely, that I can say that I agree with George, but this time... well, what can I say? He's right.
And Alex is on this big time. Of course I more often agree with him.
As Mr Salmond says, it's not just Blair; it's members of his cabinet, MoD, Civil Servants, Number 10 staff, and probably most of all, Jack Straw.
Wednesday, 25 May 2016
Tuesday, 24 May 2016
MORE RANDOM THOUGHTS...
Tories go to court to try to prevent Kent police having extra time to investigate huge sums they spent in defeating Farage in South Thanet.
Osborne is on course to miss his deficit targets, yet says Brexit will bring Britain into recession #PlankOfEngland
Sunday, 22 May 2016
RANDOM THOUGHTS
You'll love this one (well most of you will).
Suffolk Tories apparently accepted an illegal donation of £3,000 during the last election. There's no question about it. They owned up. The person who donated the money was not on the electoral register at the time the money was given.
The electoral commission ruled that they should be fined the sum of £1,100, but should not be required to return the donation.
If my arithmetic is right, they get a donation of £3,000, they are fined £1,100, so their net gain is £1,900. Not much of a punishment; not much of a disincentive to repeat the crime next time round.
Still, it's the Tories. They appear do whatever they want and walk off laughing.
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Erm, has Harriet joined the Tory party? We all know she is aristocratic and it wouldn't be stretching the imagination much to guess that she loathes Mr Corbyn, but what's this about. Don't tell us they just banged into each other.
Waitrose I might just about swallow, but ASDA? Please!
Dodgy Dave down with people again, innit? Top button undone, not singing God Save the Queen (tut tut, what would your mother say Dodge?), but wearing a suit that cost more that the bloke he's talking to earns in a year.
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A few months ago, the gross old duke of York was unhappy that he couldn't get through the gates at Windsor Great Park, where he has one of his houses...well, one of OUR houses. Apparently the mechanism for automatic opening had failed. So the fat boy decided that, as he had a great big 2.5 tonne, £80,000 Range Rover, he'd just smash the gates down...as you would, if a £5,000 repair to your car were of no interest.
The alternative would have been a 1 mile... yes a whole mile...detour. How utterly ghastly!
Well obviously a royal highness couldn't be expected to put up with that kind of inconvenience, so he broke the gates down. OUR gates that WE paid for.
If you lived in your own home and you decided that you would trash your gates to save yourself a little inconvenience, that would be your business. If you lived in a council house, or one owned by a housing association or the state, then it becomes their business.
Most people would call it criminal damage and charges would be brought.
Needless to say Air Miles is getting off Scot free.
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The same goes for tax pounds.
Every so often David Cameron reminds us we are a Christian country. I can't imagine why he would do that unless he was trying to stir up bad feeling with Muslims or Jews or some other religious groups: Ya know, make them feel ill at ease, not at home?
But the very people who might be considered to know a little bit more about Christian values than Dodgy Dave, that is to say the bishops of the State Church, are rather less than enthusiastic about his policies.
Not that Church of England bishops are the only ones to criticise. The leader of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales has also laid into the Tories for their heartlessness in welfare reforms. Odd given what a devout Catholic Iain Duncan Smith is.
And even odder that his replacement is one of these OTT Christians that tells us prayer can cure anything... and apparently people with Parkinson's should just get out there and get a job.
Every year some of us (admittedly a dwindling number) listen to Her Majesty's Christmas message. It's a mixture of her family news, the stuff some folk write in long tedious letters at Christmas, but she gets to put on the BBC (ya know, Andrew losing his rag with a gate; the number of holidays that the blood princesses have taken; how little work William and Kate have done; how much money they screwed out of the people of Cornwall to keep Mrs Parker Bowles in diamond tiaras, etc) together with a religious message.
She invariably talks about how she has tried to follow the teachings of Christ all of her life in everything she does. Clearly she misses out the bit about the rich man and the eye of the needle, given her immense wealth, and the "suffer the little children" bit of these teachings.
Probably feeding the 5000 passes her by, as within a few miles of Buckingham Palace some of her loyal subjects are sleeping in cardboard boxes and eating out of soup kitchens. Children subjects of hers have little or noting to eat due to the policies that she reads out from her gold throne with her multi million pound hat on her head, having stepped out of a gold coach.
It's a long time since I was forced, in this Christian country, to read the bible as part of my core curriculum, but I can recall all of those things even if I maybe don't always live up to them. It's strange that the queen has such problems with them, having dedicated her life to following such teachings.
Suffolk Tories apparently accepted an illegal donation of £3,000 during the last election. There's no question about it. They owned up. The person who donated the money was not on the electoral register at the time the money was given.
The electoral commission ruled that they should be fined the sum of £1,100, but should not be required to return the donation.
If my arithmetic is right, they get a donation of £3,000, they are fined £1,100, so their net gain is £1,900. Not much of a punishment; not much of a disincentive to repeat the crime next time round.
Still, it's the Tories. They appear do whatever they want and walk off laughing.
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Erm, has Harriet joined the Tory party? We all know she is aristocratic and it wouldn't be stretching the imagination much to guess that she loathes Mr Corbyn, but what's this about. Don't tell us they just banged into each other.
Waitrose I might just about swallow, but ASDA? Please!
Dodgy Dave down with people again, innit? Top button undone, not singing God Save the Queen (tut tut, what would your mother say Dodge?), but wearing a suit that cost more that the bloke he's talking to earns in a year.
**********
The alternative would have been a 1 mile... yes a whole mile...detour. How utterly ghastly!
Well obviously a royal highness couldn't be expected to put up with that kind of inconvenience, so he broke the gates down. OUR gates that WE paid for.
If you lived in your own home and you decided that you would trash your gates to save yourself a little inconvenience, that would be your business. If you lived in a council house, or one owned by a housing association or the state, then it becomes their business.
Most people would call it criminal damage and charges would be brought.
Needless to say Air Miles is getting off Scot free.
**********
Every so often David Cameron reminds us we are a Christian country. I can't imagine why he would do that unless he was trying to stir up bad feeling with Muslims or Jews or some other religious groups: Ya know, make them feel ill at ease, not at home?
But the very people who might be considered to know a little bit more about Christian values than Dodgy Dave, that is to say the bishops of the State Church, are rather less than enthusiastic about his policies.
Not that Church of England bishops are the only ones to criticise. The leader of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales has also laid into the Tories for their heartlessness in welfare reforms. Odd given what a devout Catholic Iain Duncan Smith is.
Every year some of us (admittedly a dwindling number) listen to Her Majesty's Christmas message. It's a mixture of her family news, the stuff some folk write in long tedious letters at Christmas, but she gets to put on the BBC (ya know, Andrew losing his rag with a gate; the number of holidays that the blood princesses have taken; how little work William and Kate have done; how much money they screwed out of the people of Cornwall to keep Mrs Parker Bowles in diamond tiaras, etc) together with a religious message.
She invariably talks about how she has tried to follow the teachings of Christ all of her life in everything she does. Clearly she misses out the bit about the rich man and the eye of the needle, given her immense wealth, and the "suffer the little children" bit of these teachings.
Probably feeding the 5000 passes her by, as within a few miles of Buckingham Palace some of her loyal subjects are sleeping in cardboard boxes and eating out of soup kitchens. Children subjects of hers have little or noting to eat due to the policies that she reads out from her gold throne with her multi million pound hat on her head, having stepped out of a gold coach.
It's a long time since I was forced, in this Christian country, to read the bible as part of my core curriculum, but I can recall all of those things even if I maybe don't always live up to them. It's strange that the queen has such problems with them, having dedicated her life to following such teachings.
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